John chapter 17 and verse 24
and down to the end of the chapter. The Lord Jesus Christ is speaking
and he says this, Father, I will that they also whom thou hast
given me be with me where I am, that they may behold my glory
which thou hast given me. for thou lovest me before the
foundation of the world. O righteous Father, the world
hath not known thee, but I have known thee, and these have known
that thou hast sent me. And I have declared unto them
thy name, and will declare it. that the love wherewith thou
hast loved me may be in them and I in them. Amen. May the Lord bless to us this
reading from his word also. In recent weeks, as we've been
considering the Lord's matchless unique intercessory prayer in
John chapter 17. I have mentioned more than once
how that implicit in the Lord's numerous requests, his intercessions,
his mediations, how implicit in these requests to his Father
on behalf of his people is a sense an air of entitlement and personal
prerogative. I've mentioned this several times.
The blessings that he sought for his redeemed people were
rights properly accruing to his people upon the successful completion
of Christ's work. And he was laying claim to these
rights as a legitimate demand according to strict justice. And we should understand that
when we read these verses. What the Savior required from
his father was his right under the terms of that covenant contract
to which each person of the Godhead was subject. The father, the
son, the Holy Spirit, all willingly entered upon the agreement to
save a people from amongst fallen humanity, the fallen sons and
daughters of Adam and Eve. This had been agreed upon from
before the foundation of the world and the Lord explicitly
states that each holy person in the Godhead assumed particular
obligations in the eternal councils of divine purpose. And here the
Lord Jesus Christ, having completed his work, claims the rights that
fall to him for the fulfilment of his obligations. So I have said then that there
is an implicit assertion That implicit assertion of the Lord's
rights here in our verses today becomes an explicit declaration
delivered with all the force of a royal decree or a Supreme
Court order. The Lord Jesus Christ says, this
is what I want to happen. This is what I will. I will,
says the Lord. I require, I demand, I expect,
according to the terms of our contract, the settlement that
we agreed upon. Namely, that they also whom thou
hast given me be with me where I am. This phrase comes with
authority and power. Christ as the God-man mediator,
Christ in his glory as the representative of his people, having fulfilled
his obligations within the covenant of grace, the terms of that covenant
having been fulfilled, claims, I say again, demands. the fulfilment
of those things which had been agreed upon. And this is foremost
in his mind, that they also, that is the Lord's church, the
Lord's people, God's elect, they also whom thou has given me,
be with me where I am. Now I made reference to man's
free will and those who say that man's free will determines who
goes to heaven. Here is the Lord saying, I will. that they whom thou hast given
me be with me where I am. This is the will of Christ on
behalf of his people and I think that this is a beautiful, I think
this is a powerful teaching of the Word of God. It is here central
to this high priestly prayer of our Lord and I trust that
the Lord will give us grace to see, to understand, and to hear
the message even of these final few verses as we come to the
end of this prayer today. Let me just say this. I do not
mean to suggest that there is any hesitancy or reluctance on
the part of the Father or indeed the Holy Spirit to fulfil these
requests of the Lord, to honour the Saviour's claim, or to comply
with His demand. Not at all. I am simply making
the point because I believe it supports the powerful truth at
the heart of the Gospel, that God's honour is intact that his
holiness is maintained, that his divine justice is satisfied
in the getting and giving of grace and mercy to sinners. God is in no way compromised. by his dispensing of mercy and
grace, even to sinners such as we are. And he is in no way compromised
by having sinners like we are accepted in his presence. because the Lord Jesus Christ
has fulfilled the work that was given him to do in the covenant
of grace. That is the heart of the gospel.
That is the doctrine of grace. We speak of free grace and free
it is at the point of need. But let us not forget it was
hard won and it was dearly paid for. under the terms of our redemption. And this fact ought to comfort
the Lord's people because it points to the solid foundation
upon which we stand before God. This is not in any way arbitrary.
This is solid, firm and sure. When the Saviour speaks here
in this intercessory prayer, when he speaks here in these
final few verses of his prayer and addresses his Father as righteous
Father, That is not merely incidental. That's not just a name that is,
as it were, plucked out of mid-air. The Lord Jesus Christ here calls
His Father, Righteous Father. He is underlining God's righteousness. It's the only time the Saviour
uses this phrase. He often speaks of my father.
He speaks of your father when he's speaking to the disciples.
He even speaks of our father. But this is the only time he
uses the title righteous father. And the reason is clear. He is
emphasising to his disciples and to us that our relationship
with God is grounded upon the righteousness of God. It's founded
upon the justice of God and it is as sure and certain as God
is holy. Now, I'm going to take a moment
here and quote another hymn to you, a little insertion here,
because you may remember how well Augustus Toplady presented
this theme, this solid foundation in his hymn. on assurance called
from whence this fear and unbelief, or at least that's its front
line. It has to do with faithfulness, I think, in its original title.
But it's a hymn about assurance of faith. It's number 227 in
the Gadsby hymn book, so if you want to look it up later, you're
welcome to do that. 227 in the Gadsby hymn book.
But this is what it says, and I'm going to repeat all four
verses because I think this is solid doctrine, and it's beautiful. Here's what he says. From whence
this fear and unbelief? Hast thou, O Father, put to grief
thy spotless Son for me? And will the righteous judge
of men condemn me for that debt of sin which Lord was charged
on thee? Complete atonement thou hast
made, and to the utmost farthing paid, the utmost penny paid,
whate'er thy people owed. How then can wrath on me take
place, if sheltered in thy righteousness, and sprinkled with thy blood?
If thou hast my discharge procured, and freely in my room endured,
the whole of wrath divine. Payment God cannot twice demand,
first at my bleeding surety's hand, and then again at mine. Turn then, my soul, unto thy
rest. The merits of thy great High
Priest speak peace and liberty. Trust in his efficacious blood,
nor fear thy banishment from God, since Jesus died for thee. Let me make a general point here.
These old free grace preachers, these old ministers like Toplady
and others, but like Toplady. they are worth reading and meditating
upon. Because these men mined the doctrines
of the gospel in order to bring forth and release their blessings. These men dug deep to uncover
these precious truths. And I fear that there is a frivolity
in much of Christian worship today that is unbecoming true
spirituality. The gospel is not light entertainment
for Sunday mornings or Sunday evenings, whatever it might be.
The gospel is solid, reasoned theology. to equip and guide
poor, needy sinners along the Christian pathway. And too much
religion today is superficial and utterly useless to men's
souls. You are getting ready to die. You will soon enter eternity
and face God. Be serious and thoughtful about
what you are and what you need. Faith must be well grounded in
truth if it is to stand in the evil day. Now let us take a moment
or two to think about what the Lord Jesus is telling us here
in these final verses and how it may be applied to strengthen
and comfort our souls. This prayer isn't just a prayer
by the Saviour to His Father. Christ is talking to us as well. He has an audience here. Remember
what we said at the beginning of this prayer. It is the only
complete prayer that the Lord made that is recorded for us
in Scripture. But it is recorded and it has
an audience. the disciples in the first place,
you and me thereafter. It's recorded for our instruction
in righteousness. The Saviour is setting forth
the great privileges that he has won for his people. and their
implications. He is setting forth the privileges,
the blessings that he has gained for the elect and he is detailing
what he wills for us and expects to be delivered to us upon his
successful completion of his duties under the covenant of
grace. He says, as it were, by finishing
the work I was given to do, I have secured your everlasting safety
and confirmed your eternal destiny. And then he looks, as it were,
to his father to say, now go about that business. He says,
as it were, it is certain that you will see my glory and share
it with me. I will it to be so. And then
he looks to his father to accomplish that aspect of the covenant of
grace. He says, as it were, you shall
have a living relationship with me and my Father, by which our
love will come to you, by which our peace will be in your soul,
will be experienced by you personally, in your heart. And he looks to
his Father to fulfil that. He says, I will dwell in your
soul. So let us briefly take these
statements of the Lord and ask him by them to increase our understanding,
to comfort our hearts and to enlarge our faith and our view
of him. The first one then is this. Our eternal destiny is here revealed
to be the endless presence and company of Jesus, our Lord and
Saviour. Brothers and sisters, think on
that. It is far from what we deserve
by nature. What we deserve is unending separation
and punishment and darkness. And that will greet many who
enter eternally into the presence of God outside
of Christ. But that is not you or me who
love the Lord and trust in Him. It is Christ's desire, it is
Christ's will that we be with him and that he be with us. The Saviour ends this prayer,
this high priestly prayer. The Saviour ends this prayer
as he began his sermon in John 14. Let not your heart be troubled. I go to prepare a place for you.
I will come again and receive you unto myself that where I
am, there ye may be also. He says it in John 17, Father,
I will that they also whom thou hast given me be with me where
I am. That where I am, there ye may
be also. Father, I will that they whom
thou hast given me be with me where I am. It is my desire, says the Lord,
to gather my people out of this world and bring them into my
presence. I've promised to do it. I've
fitted them for it. They are cleansed by blood. They
are righteous in spirit. They are justified in thy sight.
They are holy and unblameable in me. Brothers and sisters, I hope
you are as excited about this prospect as the Lord Jesus Christ
was. We shall be with Christ in his
Father's house. He calls it paradise. It is the
heavenly Jerusalem. It is the place of peace. It's the kingdom of heaven. It is the eternal kingdom. It
is our eternal inheritance. It's called a better country. where we shall sit down with
Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, which is another way of saying
all God's covenant people, the people given to Christ to be
redeemed, to be reconciled, and to be delivered. And there we
shall be at rest. There we shall be at peace. There we shall reign with Christ
and enjoy him forever. And there we shall possess everlasting
life. And there we shall obtain an
eternal weight of glory. There will be no suffering. There
will be no pain. There will be no tears. There
will be no sin. it will be fullness of joy forever. We will dwell in a state of happiness,
in a place of happiness, a place prepared for us, suitable for
us, and desirable to us. And this is what Christ wills
for himself and for us. that we be with him. It was the
joy that was set before him for which he suffered and for which
he died. And then the Lord adds this.
He wants us to be with him. I will that they be with me.
And I will that they see my glory and share in it with me. Now, I don't know. I'm not claiming to be able in
any way to comprehend all that that entails. I know that Paul
says, I hath not seen nor ear heard, neither have entered into
the heart of man the things which God hath prepared for them that
love him. And yes, the Holy Spirit has
revealed some things, but there is much more to be understood
and experienced. What do we conceive God's glory
to be? What do we conceive Christ's
glory to be? We have some concept of Christ's
glory in his handiwork, in creation. the power of the sun, in the
scale of the universe, in the magnitude of the things that
he has created. I say this to you periodically. I like when I get the opportunity
to look at some of these space programs or think about the photographs
that some of these amazing telescopes return to Earth now, or to learn
about space journeys. These things inspire me to think
that the Lord is teaching us, when we think about what appears
to be the infinite creation, something of his own infinite
power and infinite glory. That's the reason why we are
given to see these things, so that we can translate that, so
that we can transfer that into our understanding of the infinity
of Christ's glory. He sustains and upholds all things
by the power of his word. But that's only the beginning,
that's only the start. The disciples saw something of
Christ's glory on the Mount of Transfiguration, where we are
told His face did shine as the sun and His raiment was white
as the light. In Him dwells all the fullness
of the Godhead, the character of God, the infinite attributes
of God's nature, His holiness, His love, His wisdom, His majesty,
His righteousness. We cannot hardly begin to conceive
what the glory of Christ will entail, but we shall see him
as he is. We shall understand what he has
accomplished. We shall praise and worship him
with knowledge and growing awareness of all that he has done for us. and we shall participate in his
glory. The glory that he has as the
head of his body, the church, will be conveyed and communicated
to all the parts of his body so that we will share his glory
with him. Okay, not his divine glory, perhaps,
but that glory which is his as the head of the church, that
glory which was given to him in the covenant of grace. And we shall glow with the glory
of our head and rejoice in the happiness of our privileges. We shall be with Christ and we
shall see and enjoy his glory. And then the Lord Jesus Christ
goes on after having said these things. First that he wills that
we be with him and then that he wills that we see his glory
and share in it. Then he goes on to say the Saviour
also wills for his church that we do in this life and for eternity experience personally
the perfect love of God our Father. Paul writes about that love in
Romans chapter 5, verse 8 he says this, God commendeth his
love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners Christ died
for us. He goes on, much more then. So this is how we know the love
of God. This is how we see and experience
and have some tangible awareness of the love of God. Christ died
for us. So then Paul says, much more
then, being now justified by his blood. Okay, so it's the
knowledge of Christ's death. Then it's the knowledge that
that leads to our justification. We shall be saved from wrath
through him. For if when we were enemies,
we were reconciled to God by the death of his son, much more
being reconciled, we shall be saved by his death. And then
he goes on, and not only so, but we also joy in God through
our Lord Jesus Christ. by whom we have now received
the atonement. So the love of God manifests
itself in the death of Christ for us, in our justification
by the blood of Christ, by the reconciliation and acceptance
that we have with God, and in the knowledge of the joy of the
Lord. So that by having the love of
God and experiencing the love of God, I take this to mean that
the love of God teaches us we are righteous, we are reconciled,
we are saved. How do we know the love of God?
We know it because we believe we're righteous, we're reconciled,
and we're saved. Oh, and we have the joy of the
Lord in our hearts. Yes, brothers and sisters, we
have much to look forward to in heaven, in the presence of
the Lord Jesus Christ and seeing His glory. But eternal life does
not begin in heaven. It's our portion here and now. The indwelling Holy Spirit is
the earnest, it is the deposit, it's the down payment of our
inheritance with Christ, and the love of God reveals to us the purpose of Christ's coming,
the meaning of his death, and it grants the gift of quickening
grace by the new creation in our souls. That's the love of
God. It's not some esoteric, intangible
thing. It is real, it is factual, it
is based and foundational to our experience of grace. We have
a saving, joyful relationship with God in Christ. Christ mediates
God's love for us and here in his high priestly prayer, the
Lord wills it for us. He insists that His Father gives
it to us. He's talking here about the coming
of the Holy Spirit in our conversion and in opening up to us these
gospel truths. We are the beneficiaries of the
union forged between Christ and His Church. We're joint heirs
together with Him. And in taking us into himself,
we are endowed by God the Father with gifts and graces by which
our experience of God and our service for him is equipped and
enabled. Now there's much granted to dishearten
us in this life. because we contend daily against
the world, the flesh and the devil. Nevertheless, by the love
of God, we are overcomers through Christ who strengthens us. And
then very quickly, let me just make my last point, because these
are all the things that the Lord wills for us. He wills for us
to be in heaven with him. He wills for us to see his glory. He wills for us God's converting
power in our lives and the love of God, which leads us into an
understanding of all the gospel truths that have accrued to us. according to our Saviour's sacrifice.
And then he says, finally, for the purposes of our study today,
Christ himself dwells in us. It is his will, it is Christ's
will to dwell in us and to work in us mightily. Paul says, I
can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me. Yes,
the Lord is speaking to his Father, but he is teaching us, he is
comforting and encouraging his disciples, these particular men
who would for a short time imminently be bereft of his presence and
would in time face all manner of hardship in their own earthly
ministries. And he was reassuring them that
the days ahead would bring evidence of his success on the cross,
both in their own lives and in the lives of those to whom their
word and gospel testimony would come with power unto salvation. Christ himself will dwell in
his church, in us individually and in us united one with another. And he will be with us forever. Lo, he says, I am with thee always. And this is still the case, as
it was for the disciples in their ministry, so it is for the church
in all ages, and it is for you and me today. We are never alone
when we have the Lord dwelling in our hearts. I in them. And that is Christ's will. It
is Christ's will that we be with Him. It is Christ's will eternally. It is Christ's will that we see
His glory and participate in it. It is Christ's will that
the Father bestows His love upon us, the same love that He has
given to Christ under the covenant terms, and that love reveals
to us all that Christ has accomplished for us. and this he wills also,
that he will be in us, I in them. It is our happiness in this our
lifetime to have so learned Christ. Learned him as to know him to
be our victorious saviour and to have been brought in our lifetimes
to trust in both the success of His work and the rule of His will. Christ
in us. the hope of glory. Our knowledge
of Christ, our indwelling by Christ, and these great gospel
doctrines of free, sovereign, efficacious grace give substance
to our hope of glory. This isn't, let me repeat myself,
this isn't frivolous and frothy. This is deep, profound theology,
and it is the ground and foundation of our faith. Because we know
these things, we are blessed in our lives, and we are enabled
to serve and follow the Lord better. Our present grace And
our future glory is not a dubious prospect, but a confident expectation
founded on covenant promise, settled in the divine will and
secured by Christ's precious blood. That is what the Lord
is telling us in John chapter 17. Our hope, our confidence
is enlarged and enhanced by this wonderful prayer. Our Lord intercedes
for us, even yet with his Father. May we always treasure John 17.
May we return to it often to enjoy its doctrinal depth. its inspired insights and its
heavenly truth. Amen.